Major Tom

By
John NaughtonPhotos by Dylan Don | Styling by Jo Levin01 November 13

As he prepares to resurrect the villainous Loki in Thor: The
Dark World, Tom Hiddleston reveals what it's like to be wanted
by Spielberg, Allen and Branagh and why this is only the beginning
of his A-list adventure...

If you need an illustration of how fast and how far Tom Hiddleston's star has risen in the past
three years, compare and contrast his last two appearances at San
Diego Comic-Con, the convention where studios tout their
forthcoming wares to a ravening army of geeks by whose tweets and
posts an action movie will stand or fall. In 2010, Hiddleston sat
on stage as Thor director Kenneth Branagh
outlined plans for his forthcoming movie, introduced Chris Hemsworth as the titular Norse god, and
Hiddleston as his adopted brother and nemesis, Loki. There was a
brief Q&A, Hiddleston answered one question, and everyone went
home.

Fast forward to 3pm, Saturday 20 July 2013, and in Hall H of the
San Diego Convention Centre, ahead of the imminent release of
Thor: The Dark World, an army of 6,000 fans repeatedly
scream "Loki" in a manner so fevered as to make One Direction
concert-goers look like a chapter of tongue-tied Trappists.
Hiddleston, both in character and full Loki costume, is berating
the audience, hissing, "Humanity! Look how far you've fallen,
lining up in the sweltering heat for hours, huddling in the dark,
like beasts!" By the time Hiddleston has borrowed a line from
Avengers Assemble and addressed the crowd
as: "You mewling quim!" and advance footage has shown him appear
to chop off Thor's hand, the roof is ready to blow.

The stunt has been three weeks in the making, beginning with a
phone call from Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige to Hiddleston,
who was at Wimbledon for the ladies' quarterfinals. They knock a
few ideas back and forth, Hiddleston insists he must stay in
character throughout and plans are put in place to maintain
complete secrecy. This involves Hiddleston arriving at Comic-Con
disguised as Star Wars' bounty hunter Jango Fett (the only
place in the world where such behaviour wouldn't arouse suspicion).
At 3pm, as Feige is about to address the crowd, Loki appears on
stage.

"It was a riot," recalls Hiddleston a few weeks later, sitting
in the calmer surroundings of the paved garden at the back of his
Haverstock Hill local in north London with a pint of Amstel at
hand. "It was mayhem, I [was] in costume, giving a speech, getting
people to kneel at my feet. It was deranged and bananas."

Both adjectives which could equally be applied to everything
which has happened in Hiddleston's life over the past three years,
a period which has seen him transform from a respected stage actor
with a malnourished film and TV CV to the man who delivered a
show-stealing performance complete with epic cavalry charge in
Steven Spielberg's War Horse, who Woody Allen asked for by
name for his comeback hit Midnight In Paris, who won the
part of Prince Hal/Henry V in the BBC's epic Shakespearean
tetralogy (four-parter, to you and me) The Hollow Crown
and, as the aforementioned Asgardian bad boy, starred in the
biggest film of 2012, Avengers Assemble, which is also the
third highest-grossing film of all time.

How did that happen?

"Maybe it's just getting older," reflects the 32-year-old. "You
become so palpably aware this is not a dress rehearsal. There's a
big sign in blazing neon that says You Haven't Got Long. But I
think it takes a beat to learn that. Life has to knock you down in
order for you to realise it, because when you're a kid you think
you're immortal."

"Basically, I'm a madman."

Conscious perhaps of not repeating himself, over the course of
the afternoon Hiddleston prefaces only one of his many stories with
the above phrase, but in actual fact, the phrase would fit more
than a few. Not that Hiddleston in person fits the description. As
he ambles into the pub today, sans entourage, a fleeting look
of semi-recognition crosses the barmaid's face, but it's clear she
hasn't quite clocked him. He could be the villainous star of the
third biggest film of all time, or he could, at a push, be doing
well in a digital marketing company in Shoreditch. I ask him if
he's ever worn the Loki hairstyle when he's out on the town to
aid recognition, but he answers in the negative.

"It's very Seventies," he says, laughing. "If we ever did a Loki
origins story he should be running a Seventies nightclub, I think.
Opening scene, you'd see him burst through the double doors,
wearing a really lean floral suit, 'Sympathy For The Devil' on the
soundtrack, say hello to a few girls, get on the decks to spin a
few tracks, his hair looking sleek and menacing. I should say
my mum's not sure. She came to the Avengers premiere and
she said, 'Darling, it's a bit severe, isn't it?'"

His Avengers' co-star Scarlett Johansson has warned me that "he has
a secret sweet tooth - I've never seen anyone devour sugar the way
he does", but his physique - like all actors he is startlingly (OK,
sickeningly) slimmer in the flesh - betrays no evidence of this
dark habit. Is he handsome? It's a question that seems to exercise
a sizeable slice of the internet with his dedicated army of
"Hiddlestoners" - like their near-relatives, the "Cumberbitches" -
prepared to fight to the death on the point. Of course he is,
although with features which betray his Celtic lineage, it's more
of an old Hollywood look. Spielberg has likened him to Errol Flynn
and it's a comparison which seems most relevant.

He seems considerate, too. Certainly, he's the only person I've
ever interviewed who's worried that the rustling noise inherent in
the transporting of crisps from packet to mouth might affect the
quality of my recording.

So where does the "madman" stuff fit in? Well, here's one of his
favourite memories of playing Loki: "We were shooting on top of a
volcano in Iceland," he recalls with a grin. "There was a fight
sequence where Loki has to take a big hit. He's sort of thrown back
and falls on to the ground. I did a real-life high jump, I took a
run-up to a mark, did a Fosbury Flop and then, smack!"

On to a mat?

"No, on to the surface of the volcano! But then I saw the shot
afterwards and whatever was happening in my face, I could never
have acted that."

He segues from this to describing the positives of being
accidentally punched in the face by Chris Hemsworth during an
action sequence shot for the original Thor.

"You don't make any facial expression when that happens. Just
before the blood starts to flow, your face goes incontrovertibly
still. It looks great in the film."

Then with the next breath, Hiddleston - whose interpretation of
Loki has been such a success that Thor: The Dark World
director Alan Taylor is shooting extra scenes with the actor for
the new movie - outlines his ideas about the character. He speaks
of Loki occupying "that liminal point between order and chaos",
delivers a brief but erudite tour of the major developments in
modern psychology - he will later mention Mark Ruffalo's "hulking
manifestations of the Freudian id" - and concludes by offering
several areas of mythological comparison.

There are probably a few actors out there who would be prepared
to suffer the kind of knocks that come with hurling oneself
backwards on to a rocky volcanic outcrop, but how many of those
could also hold their own on In Our Time with Melvyn
Bragg?

John Naughton

Contributing Editor John Naughton has interviewed Daniel Craig, David Beckham and Scarlett Johansson for GQ. Career highlight? Arm-wrestling Dolph Lundgren.